Turkish Coffee

With overshirts being all the rage this year, I found a nice corduroy shirt jacket at the store formerly known as MQ at 20% off. However, as I am just learning that the conference in Vaasa has been cancelled due to the SARS-CoV-2 virus and with a high probability that my remaining classes will soon get cancelled as well, I guess I will not have much use for it outside Rawls & Me.

Over the last couple of days, several people have independently of each other asked me what I think about electric aircrafts. While I am generally a fan of low-carbon innovation, I think that there are many other sectors where far greater emissions reductions can be had at a fraction of the cost. If anything, I would rather recommend a policy that mandated the use of Direct Air Capture (DAC) of all emissions from the aviation sector, something that would make it possible to keep existing airplanes and infrastructure while pioneering a technology that will be absolutely essential if we are to ever reverse climate change. Another concern has to do with the electricity used to power any future electric airplanes. If that electricity comes from nuclear or hydro as in Sweden, then there is really a potential of decarbonization, if it comes from coal or renewables + natural gas as in much of Europe, the equation looks quite different.